In this post Scott Sumner muses:
It’s interesting to note that all eight EU countries on the Mediterranean (or close by in the case of Portugal) opted to get into the euro, whereas most of the countries in the far north stayed out (Sweden, Denmark, Britain, and of course Iceland and Norway stayed entirely out of the EU.) What explains this pattern? Perhaps this is just the standard problem of clubs; those who see themselves as better than average prefer to stay out, and vice versa.
Leaving Britain aside, in order of ‘association’ with the euro we have:
- Finland: in EU and belongs to euro
- Denmark: in EU and linked to euro
- Sweden: in EU but not linked to euro
- Norway: outside EU and not linked to euro
- Iceland: outside EU and not linked to euro
Norway and Iceland have the same degree of ‘independence’. The only difference is distance, with Iceland located halfway to Greenland!
How did they fare? It appears the more closely tied to the euro a country is the worse the outcome.
Norway´s NGDP sways with oil. Recently Lars Christensen called attention to a presentation by the head of the Norwegian central bank which showed the relative stability of the non-oil Norwegian NGDP. This post has a take.
Iceland looks like a ‘special case’ (see here)
Unfortunately it seems Lars Svensson is losing influence over the board of the Sveriges Riskbank! Sweden is falling prey to the inflation nutters.
Historinhas 
Yes, Marcus. It IS an interesting question, “that all eight EU countries on the Mediterranean (or close by in the case of Portugal) opted to get into the euro, whereas most of the countries in the far north stayed out”. Behind this question there are several unfinded answers. In any case, I can tell you that Spaniards, until now, don’t realise The relation between Depression and Euro.